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igSi. September^ 6th. 1881. 

THE 

Battle of Eroton Heights; 

The Massacre of Fort Griswold; 

— AND — 

The Burning of Hgw London. 



HISTORICAL SKETCH BY JGHM J, COPP, ESQ, OF GROTON, 

— AND — 

ADDRESS BY LEONARD WOOLSEY BACON, OF NORWICH. 

— ON — 

The Ninety-Eighth Anniversary, Sept. 6th, 1879. 



'"If I were an American, as I am an Englishman, while a foreign troop was lauded in my 
country, I never would lay down my arms— «e«cr, never, never.'''' 
"You cannot, my lords, you cannot conquer America.''^ — Lord Chatham. 



Published by authority of 

The Groton Heights Centennial Committee, 

December, 1879. 



Officers and Members of the Erolon Heights Cealennial Comittee. 



President : 
J. GEOKGE HAERIS, of Groton. 

Yice Presidents : 

BENJAMIN STARK, New London, 
WILLIAM H. POTTER, Groton, 
JOHN BREWSTER, Ledyard. 

Secretary : 

;< JOHN J. COPP, Groton. 

Treasurer : 

CHRISTOPHER L. AVERY, Groton. 

Members : 

Robert A. Gray, Groton. 

Frederic Bili,, " 

Daniel C. Rodman, 
John B. Getchell, 
Braddock M. Chester, '• 

Erasmus D. Avery, 
Elisha a. Hewitt, 
Robert A. Morgan, " 

GuRDON Gates, 
David A. Daboll, 
Nathan S. Fish, 
ALBERT L. Avery, " 

William H. Miner, " 

N. T. Allen " 

Elihu Spicer, " 

William H. Tubes, New London. 
V'- Stephen A. Gardner, Jr., ^ " 

^*\ George F. Tinker, ' " 

> ^<ij Charles All yn, 

^ ^. ^ Elisha V. Daboll, 

v'^-x, Charles D. Boss, Jr., " 

Christopher A. Brown, Ledyard. 
Nbhemiah M. Gallup, 
Edmund Spicek. 
Sandford B. Stoddard, " 
Erasmus Avery, " 

James A. Billings, " 



\. 



INTRODUCTION, 



As the time approaches for the looth anniversary of the 
battle and massacre of Groton Heights and the burning of 
New London, which took place on Sept. 6th, 1781, it has 
seemed to the citizens of Groton and New London that a 
great and notable commemoration of those events should be 
made. 

The battle of Groton Heights is the only battle fought on 
the soil of Connecticut during the War of Independence, and 
that it was a battle worthy of the name, the heavy loss of the 
British in officers and men sufficiently attests. 

The massacre which followed the battle was so unexampled, 
so contrary to civilized warfare that everything else was for- 
gotten in its horrors and barbarities. 

But it is to be hoped, that now that time has assuaged our 
indignant grief, we may look upon the events of that 6th day 
of September with calm judgment, and give them their true 
place in the historic drama of the American Revolution. 

Let every fact be gathered and a record be made which 
shall outlast the afranite monument that rises in solemn o-radeur 
above the spot where heroic blood was poured out like water. 

The men who withstood the invader, the Averys, the Allyns, 
the Baileys, the Billings', the Burrows', the Chesters, the 
Chapmans, the Coits, the Halseys, the Hempsteads, the 
Ledyards, the Lathams, the Lesters, the Morgans, the Per- 
kins', the Starrs, the Seaburys, the Seymours, the Stantons, 
the Woodbridges, the Williams', are early names among the 
planters of the Colony. And here on this hill they reappear 
after a century of struggle with the savage foe and the 
inhospitable elements, to assert their right to the institutions 



which they have founded and to the soil which they have 
cultivated. 

The States of Massachusetts, Vermont, Rhode Island, New 
York, Pensylvania, and Georgia, have celebrated their Revo- 
lutionary Centennials with distinguished ceremonies. The 
State of Virginia is putting forth her energies and calling upon 
the nation to render illustrious the Centennial of Yorktown. 
Let not the Commonwealth of Connecticut be unmindful of 
the glorious part which she took in the War of Independence, 
but rather let her show to her sister states and to ihe nation, 
that she cherishes with just pride, the heroic deeds and patri- 
otic sacrifices of her sons. 

JOHN J. COPP, Secretary. 
Groton, Dec. i6th, 1879. 



Minnies of llie Sroton HeiiMs Centennial CoMiltee. 



At the annual meeting of the Groton Monument Association, on Sept. 6th, 
1879, the following resolution was passed : — 

Resolved by the Groton Monument Association, that a committee of three 
be appointed, to be styled The Centennial Committee, to make arrangements 
for the one hundreth anniversary of the Battle of Groton Heights, to celebrate 
the same in a manner worthy of the great event, and to co-operate with any 
committee that may be appointed by the citizens of Groton and other towns 
for that purpose. Christopher L. Avery, Robert A. Gray, and Frederic Bill, 
were appointed. 

This resolution was presented later in the day, to the assembly of ladies 
and gentlemen who were met to observe the 98th anniversary of the battle, 
within the ramparts of the old fori, and the following resolution was there- 
upon passed : 

Resolved, That a Centennial Committee be appointed to co-operate with 
the Groton Monument Association, in making such arrangements as shall be 
necessary for the proper observance of the 100th anniversary of the Battle of 
Groton Heights, and that they request the Mayor and Citizens of New 
London to unite with them for that purpose. 

Col. Daniel C. Rodman, John J. Copp, Braddock M. Chester, and John B. 
Getchell, were appointed with power to add to their number from time to 
time. 

The Mayor of New London acting upon the suggestion contained in the 
resolution, made response as follows : — 

New London, October 4th, 1876. 
Col. D. C. Rodman and others : 

Gentlemen : — In response to the suggestion of the meeting of Groton, on 
the 6th day of September last, I have selected the gentlemen named below 
as a committee on the part of the city, for the purpose of arranging a proper 
commemoration of the approaching centennial of the massacre on Groton 
Heights and the burning of New Louden, Sept. 6th, 1781 : 

Benjamin Stark, Charles D. Boss, Jr., Col. William H. Tubbs, Stephen 
A. Gardner, Jr., George F. Tinker, Charles Allyn, Elisha V. Daboll. 

Respectfully, 

T. M. Waller, Mayor. 

The Groton Committee subsequently added to their number, and sent an 
invitation to the town of Ledyard to appoint a committee. It was acted 
upon at the annual town meeting, and John Brewster, Christopher A. Brown, 
Edmund Spicer, Sandford B. Stoddard, Erasmus Avery, James A. Billings, 
and Nehemiah M. Gallup, were appointed. 



The Committees of the three towns met on Wednesday, November 12th, 
1879, at the vestry of the Congregational Church in Groton, and organized 
under the name of "The Groton Heights Centennial Committee.'"' 

J. George Harris, U. S. N., of Groton, was elected President, ; Benjamin 
Stark, of New London, William H. Potter, of Groton, and John Brewster, of 
Ledyard, Vice Presinents ; John J. Copp, was elected Secretary, and Christo- 
pher L. Avery, Treasurer. 

The Secretary read the following communications in reply to inquiries 
respecting appropriations for centennial purposes in other states. 

COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS, 
Treasury Departmeist, 

Boston, Oct. 23nd, 1879. 
John J. Copp, Esq,, Sec. &c., Groton, Conn., 

Bear Sir : — Yours of the 20th is received. Our Legislature in 1875 passed 
three Resolves appropriating money for the Centennial Celebration of the 
Battle of Bunker Hill, to wit : 

1st Resolve. Chapter 59. Appropriating $10,000 "to defray the necessary 
expenses attending the reception and entertainment of the President and 
Vice President of the United States and other distinguished guests of the 
Commonwealth," &c. 

2nd Resolve. Chapter 70. Appropriating $5,000, for the compensation 
and transportation of the volunteer militia. 

ord Resolve. Chapter 77. Appropriating $2,000 additional for the pur 
poses named in the two preceeding resolves. 
Substantially, all these sums were expended. 

Very respectfully, 

Chas. Endicott, Treasurer. 

CITY OF BOSTON, 
Office of Auditor op Accounts, 

22nd Oct., 1879. 
John J. Copp, Esq., Secretary, &c.. 

Dear Sir : — The City of Boston expended in celebrating the one-hundreth 
anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill, thirty-four thousand two hundred 
and forty-three dollars and ninety-six cents, $(84,243 96). 

In addition to this sura, the state paid certain expenses of the militia. 

Yours truly,- 
Alfred T. Turner, Auditor of Accounts. 

STATE OF VERMONT, 

Treasurer's Office, 
Montpelier, Nov. 21st, 1879. 
J. J. Copp, 

gij-' ; — Your favor of 17th at hand. This state appropriated for erection of 
monument in commemoration of Battle of Bennington, $15,000, and for 
Centennial Celebration, $2,000. 

Respectfully, 

J. A. Page, Treasurer. 



A preamble and resolution was read and adopted by a rising vote, to wit : 

Whereas, The Battle of Groton Heights was one of the closing events of 
the American Revolution, preceding the final surrender of the British forces 
at Yorktown only one month and thirteen days, and is logically and histori- 
cally connected with that great event ; and 

Whereas, The Battle of Bunker Hill, at the opening of the war, although 
a defeat, inspired the fathers with confidence in what their arms could do, 
so that they no longer sought for any adjustment with the mother country, 
but determined fully and finally upon independence, so the Battle of Groton 
Heights although a defeat and a massacre with its second Warren, in the 
person of Ledyard, in a like manner showed the unyielding spirit and daunt- 
less courage of the Americans, and made impossible all compromises short 
of full and complete independence , and 

Whereas, The other states of the Union have celebrated with military pomp 
and civic display the Centenary of their battle fields, and the state of Virginia 
has already commenced preparations for the Centennial of Torktown, on 
Oct. 19th, 1881 ; now therefore, 

Resolved, That the people of Connecticut have just cause to glory in the 
part which their fathers took in the War of Independence and especially 
may they rejoice in the valor, the patriotism, and the heroic sacrifice which 
was displayed at Groton Heights on Sept. 6ih, 1781, when a band of one 
hundred and sixty farmers and sailors fought valiantly against superior 
numbers of British troops, inflicting severe loss upon them and choosing 
death rather than surrender her soil to the invader. 

And we call upon the people and the legislature of the state to join in 
making the one hundreth anniversary of the battle on Sept. 6th, 1881, an 
occasion worthy of the sacrifice which it commemorates, and worthy of the 
character, the prosperity and the intelligence of the Commonwealth of 
Connecticut. 

Besohed, That the Legislature of the State be requested to pass such bills 
as are necessary, during the coming session, to provide for all military 
expenses connected with the Centennial, the entertainment and transportation 
of visiting militia, the entertainment of the Chief Magistrate of the U. S., 
his Cabinet, and other officers of the General Government, and for the 
Governors of other States 

It was voted that the secretary should publish the address of Eev. Leonard 
Woolsey Bacon, of Norwich, delivered at the late anniv^ersary together with 
his historical sketch, and such other matter as should be of interest at this 
time. 

The Committee met Dec. 10th and appointed Erasmus D. Avery, Benjamin 
Stark, and William H. Potter, a committee to memorialize the Legislature 
upon the subject of the Centennial. 

Attest : JOHN J. COPP, Secretary. 



(nr^ 




Old Fort Gris^ATold. 

EXPLANATION OF GROUND PLAN. 

1. Central area, 150x110 feet, surrounded by a face wall from 2 to 5 feet high. 

2. Rampart, — width at entrance 30 feet from the face wall. 

3. Ditch 30 feet wide. 

4. Breastwork to protect the entrance to the fort. 

5. Entrance 12 feet wide. 

6. Well. 

7. Sally-port. 

8. Covered way leading from the sally-port to water battery. 

9. Ruin in the center. Cellar 22x10 feet. 

10. Ruin, 38x12 feet. 

11. Natural ledge forming part of the wall. 

12. Battery or redoubt about 120 rods from the gate. 

The fort faces the north. No ditch on the south on account of the slope of the 
land, hence the British troops chose the south-west bastion for their main attack, 
and it was here that the fort was carried. 

For the Ground Plan and the explanation I am indebted to Miss Stella C. Brown, 

lately of Groton, now of South Hadley, Mass. 

«J. J. C 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 



By JOHN J. COPP, of Groton. 



Ladies and Gentlemen ; Fellow Citizens : 

The Battle of Groton Heights must be viewed in its 
relations to other events of the American Revolution. It was 
not a single and isolated event. It was a scene in the great 
act which closed at Yorktown, in the surrender of Lord 
Cornwallis. Groton Heights stands connected with Yorktown. 
Had there been no seige of Yorktown, there would have been 
no Battle of Groton Heights and no Burning of New London. 

During the summer of 1781, the Continental Government 
had been informed that a fleet and a body of land troops was 
about to arrive from France under Count de Grasse, to co- 
operate with the American forces against the British. Wash- 
ington and Rochambeau had held an interview, and resolved 
to lay seige to New York and wrest it from the British. Gener- 
al Clinton, commander in chief of the British forces, began to 
bend everything to the defense of this stronghold. With the 
exception of Charleston and Savannah, and a few such strong- 
holds, all the territory of the colonies, was recovered into the 
power of Congress. While these preparations were going 
on for the defense of New York, Washington changed his 
purpose. The insufficiency of the allied forces to capture so 
large an army as that now gathered under Clinton : the diffi- 
culty of crossing the bar which lies at the entrance of New 
York harbor with a large fleet like that of de Grasse's, deter- 
mined him upon the more feasible plan of la3'ing seige to the 
army of Cornwallis in Virginia. So effectually did Washing- 
ton conceal his ultimate design, that he marched his forces 
around New York, crossed tlie Hudson, made rapid marches 



10 

through the State of New Jersey, and was well on his wa^^ 
towards the head of Chesapeake Bay before General Clinton 
suspected that his movements had any other end in view than 
the seige of New York. It was now the 28th of August and 
Cornwallis with seven. thousand men was hemmed in between 
the James and York rivers. La Fayette was in his rear. 
Count De Grasse with a fleet of twentv-five sail of the line 
had blocked up the mouths of the two rivers. Sir Henry 
Clinton lulled into a profound slumber as to the real purposes 
of the allies, was suddenly awakened to the perilous situation 
of Cornwallis and resolved to extricate him. Admiral Graves 
with nineteen sail of the line was dispatched to the Chesa- 
peake; there he encountered Count deGrasse. A naval skirmish 
ensued in which he suffered the heavier loss, and he returned 
to New York. Twenty thousand French and American troops 
were now converging upon Cornwallis. Washington was 
still at the head of Chesapeake Bay waiting transportation. 
*The 'British General aimed to draw him back, and for that 
purpose, he planned a diversion into Connecticut, the colony 
that had furnished the largest quotas to the Continental Army, 
the cqmmonwealth of Washington's dear friend and faithful 
supporter, Jonathan Trumbull. 

Benedict Arnold, "that infamous traitor," had just returned 
from an expedition into Virginia, in which he had marked 
his path with conflagration and slaughter. He was selected 
for the new enterprise. Grand preparations were made. The 
objective point was New London, a rich and flourishing town 
for those days and filled with spoils recently captured. The 
expedition promised plunder as well as strategic advantages. 

On the afternoon of September 4th, 1781, a fleet of thirty- 
two sail under command of Benedict Arnold left New York. 
On the afternoon of the 5th, at 2 o'clock, they came to anchor 



*0n the second of September, while the American Army was marchino' through Phila- 
delphia, Sir Henry Clinton sent a courier vessel to Yorktowu with the following dispatch : 
(Clinton to Cornwallis.) "September 2nd, 1781,"' (In cypher,) Received 1.5th September. 

"Mr. Washington is moving an army to the southward with an appearance of haste, and 
gives out that he expects the co-operation of a considerable French armament. Your 
lordship, however, may be assured, that if this is the case, I shall either endeaver to rein- 
force the army under your command by all the means within the compass of my power, or ■ 
make evei'y imssible diversion in your favor.^" — Carriiigton's Battles of the American Revo- 
lution, p. t>24. 



11 

oft' Long Island shore about opposite New London. Here 
they waited for darkness and the south-west wind, hoping to 
arrive in the harbor at midnight, suprise the garrisons, capture 
the forts and prevent the escape of the shipping. At 7 p. m. 
tlie fleet weighed anchor and stood for New London with a 
fair wind. At i o'clock next morning they arrived off the 
mouth of the river, when the wind suddenly shifted to the 
northward, and it was 9 o'clock in the forenoon before the 
transports could beat in. Capt. William Latham, a soldier of 
the Continental Army, who had seen service at Bunker Hill, 
had charge of the garrison of Fort Griswold. About 3 o'clock 
in the morning the fleet had been descried by a sentinal from 
the fort, and Capt. Latham had sent notice to Colonel William 
Ledyard who was in command of the forts and harbor of 
New London. The signal to call the militia in from the out- 
lying towns was two guns fired at intervals. Col. Ledyard 
ordered the signal guns to be fired. The British seem to have 
understood the signal and fired a third gun which broke the 
alarm. Col. Leydard, however, had taken the precaution to 
send out expresses, one to Governor Trumbull at Lebanon, 
and others to commanders of militia in the neighborhood, to 
hasten to the defense of the fort. Many treated the alarm 
lightly — others disbelieved altogether. For six years they 
had been subject to alarms and gun firings. But Col. Ledyard, 
"caught its tones with death's prophetic ear." Taking leave 
of some friends as he crossed the river from New London he 
said, "if I must lose to-day, honor or life, you, who know me 
can tell which it will be," 

At 10 o'clock, Thursday morning, September 6th, 1781, the 
British troops in two divisions, of about eight hundred men 
each, landed on either side of the river ; that on New London 
side, under the traitor Arnold; that on the Groton side, under 
Lieutenant Colonel E3'^re. Arnold's division marched up the 
Tovv-n Hill road from which he sent a detachment under Capt. 
Millet which captured Fort Trumbull, then a mere water 
battery, open from behind, in which were twenty-three men 
under command of Capt. Adam Shapley. Capt. Shapley 
finding it idle to resist so large a body of troops, threw a few 



12 

charges of shot into them as they came up, then spiked liis 
guns and started his command across the river in three boats. 
The British fleet was so near that they were subject to their 
fire during the flight across the river and one boat with seven 
men was captured. Shapley with the remaining sixteen, 
among whom was Sergeant Hempstead, found shelter in Fort 
Griswold, where the little garrison welcomed them with many 
demonstrations of joy, for they were experienced artillerists. 
From the summit of Town Hill at ii o'clock, Arnold had 
dispatched an officer to Colonel Eyre, giving him such tory 
information as he had received; to the effect that there were 
only twenty or thirty men in Fort Griswold, the inhabitants 
being chiefly concerned in saving their property, and bidding 
him make all haste in his attack on the fort. Colonel Eyre 
was landing his troops at Eastern Point in two debarkations. 
The 40th and 54th regiments were the first to land and with 
these he started for the scene of action. A lame boy (the 
name of this boy was Bill Herrin) was cc5mpelled to act as 
their guide. Over the rocks and through the swamps Bill 
Herrin went limping along followed by the British regulars 
till he got them into Dark Hollow, near the old house formerly 
occupied by Deacon Austin Aver)^ From this place, just in 
tlie rear of Packers Rocks, Col. Eyre sent Capt. Beckwith, a 
New Jersey loyalist, "to demand the immediate surrender of the 
fort, with a threat, that if the demand was not complied with, 
it would be stormed five minutes after the return of the flag." 
The second debarkation of Col. Eyre's troops consisting of 
the 3rd battalion of New Jersey volunteers with a detachment 
of yagers and artillery, did not arrive in time to take part in 
the storming of the fort. 

There were now 160 men in Fort Griswold. There was Col. 
William Ledyard, brother of John Ledyard the traveller. 
There was Capt. William Latham, Capt. Amos Stanton, Capt. 
Simeon AUyn, Capt. Samuel Allyn, Capt. Elisha Avery, Capt. 
Elijah Avery, Capt. Youngs Ledyard, Capt. John Williams, 
Capt. Hubbard Burrows, Capt. Nathan Moore, Capt. Solomon 
Perkins, Capt. Edward Latham, Lieut. Joseph Lewis, Lieut. 
Eben^zer Avery, Lieut. Henry Williams, Lieut, Patrick Ward, 



18 

Lieut. Park Avery? Lieut Obadiah Perkins, Lieut. William 
Starr, Ensign John Lester, Ensign Daniel Avery, Ensign 
Charles Eldridge, Ensign Joseph Woodmancy, Ensign Ebene- 
zer Avery, Sergeant Eldridge Chester, Sergt. John Stedman, 
Sergt. Solomon Avery, Sergt. Jasper Avery, Sergt. Ezekial 
Bailey, Sergt. Rufus LIurlburt, Sergt. Nicholas Starr, Sergt. 
Rufus Avery, Sergt. Christopher Avery, and eighty-six others, 
mostly farmers and farmers sons from Groton, including the 
present town of Ledyard. There was Capt. Adam Shapley, 
Capt. Peter Richards, Lieut. Richard Chapman, Sergt. Stephen 
Hempstead, and nine others from New London. There were 
the Stanton Brothers and Thomas Williams from Stonington, 
the Whittlesey Brothers and Daniel Williams from Sa3-brook, 
and Capt. Elias H. Halsey of Bridgehampton, Long Island. 
These are the heroes of Groton Heights. "These are the 
names, the immortal names, that were not born to die." 

The men that day who chose to save their property, or from 
a safe distance on the heights and hills beyond, to watch the 
unequal conflict, have long been forgotton. They have met 
the common fate. "The places that once knew them, know them 
no more forever." But how tenderly, how proudly are the 
names of Ledyard's valiant band cherished in the hearts of the 
people. Death has no power over them. Generations shall 
come and go and be forgotten, this monument shall totter and 
fall and mingle again with the soil; conflagration may sweep 
off yonder city and its site become the camping ground of 
savage hordes; revolution may overthrow the Government 
and the Republic may be destroyed; yea, the ocean may waste 
the shore and the sea again claim the continent for its bed, but 
History on ever during tablets shall record their valor, their 
patriotism and their sufi'erings. 

To the impudent demand of the British officer Col, Ledyard 
sent back word that "he would defend the fort to the last," 
and Capt. Beckwith returned with the flag to headquarters. 

While this was going on Arnold had gained the heights 
back of New London. The gunners of Fort Griswold were 
throwing shot across the river into Fort Trumbull and sub- 
jecting the English on the hills an outskirts of the town to a 
galling fire. 



14 

It was now between u and 12 o'clock. Arnold stood on 
the tomb of the Winthrops in the old burial ground, and with 
his field glass surveyed the scene. What conflict of emotion 
boiled in the uneasy breast of the arch traitor, as he cast his 
eye around the happy scene of his early life which he was 
now ravishing with sword and torch we may not know. But 
what he thought it would cost his army to take Fort Griswold 
from Col. Ledyard and his little company of farmers and 
sailor boys he has not left us to doubt. In liis report to Sir 
Henry Clinton, he says: "on my gaining a height of ground 
in the rear of New London, from which I had a good pros- 
pect of Fort Griswold, I found it much more formidable than 
I expected, or than I had formed an idea of, from the informa- 
tion 1 had received. I observed at the same time that the men 
who had escaped from Fort Trumbull, had crossed the river 
in boats and had thrown themselves into Fort Griswold. I 
immediately dispatched a boat with an officer to Lieutenant 
Colonel Eyre to countermand my first order to attack the fort, 
but the officer arrived a few minutes too late. Lieutenant 
Col. Eyre had sent Capt. Bcckwith to demand the surrender 
of the fort which was peremptorily refused, and the attack 
had commenced. After a most obstinate defence of forty 
minutes the fort was carried by the superior bravery and per- 
severance of the battalions." 

It was the hour of noon. The battle had begun. Colonel 
Eyre led one regiment and Major Montgomery the other to 
the assault. Eyre formed his line behind Packer's Rocks, 
Montgomery deployed his to the north. And so, with gleam- 
ing guns and nodding plumes, tliey extend a long and fiery 
wave from north to south and fill the held. With shouts and 
yells thoy rend the air; over walls and rocks, over fields of 
ripening corn, through upland pastures on they come like 
mad men. As when a rocky headland in the sea projects its 
front against tlie north-east storm and beats the assaulting 
oc-ean into spray, so Ledyard and his patriot band transported 
into courage such as heroes feel, received the British files and 
beat them back. Time would fail me to tell how Capt. Elias 
Halsey with an eightccn-pounder, at one discharge, swept 



twenty red coats down; how Capt. Shapley wounded Colonel 
Eyre; how Jordan Freeman, Ledyard's colored man, ran 
a boat pike through brave Mongomery, as he broke over the 
north-east bastion, and he tell lifeless back; how Stephen 
Hempstead with his pike, his left arm being wounded, cleared 
a breach ; how Samuel Edgcomb raised great cannon balls 
and smote the assailants in the ditch below : how Park Avery 
in the hottest of the fight, cheered his son a lad of seventeen 
and the next moment saw him bite the dust ; how Helton 
Allyn, a gentle, pious boy, fell on the ramparts and went up 
to heaven. With gun stocks, pikes and canon balls, they 
fought in hand to hand encounter, one against five. Arnold's 
Report describes in official language what happened. He 
saj^s, "the troops approached on three sides of the work, which 
was a square with flankers, made a lodgement in the ditch, 
and under a heavy fire which they kept up on the works, 
eifected a second lodgement upon the fraizing, which was 
attended with great difficulty, as only a few pickets could be 
forced out or broken in a place, and was so high that the 
soldiers could not ascend without assisting each' other. Here 
the coolness and bravery of the troops was very conspicuous, 
as the first who ascended the fraise were obliged to silence a 
nine-pounder, which enfiladed the place upon which they stood 
until a sufficient body had collected to enter the works, which 
was done with fixed bayonets through the embrazures, where 
they were opposed with great obstinacy by the garrison with 
long spears." 

The punishment and loss of the British was now completed. 
The dead, the dying and the wounded that lay in the ditches 
and fields around, were the work of the stout hearted little 
garrison. Who and how many they were, we learn from 
Arnold's returns^ "i major, i ensign, 2 sergeants, and 44 
rank and file, killed ; i lieutenant colonel, 3 captains, 2 
lieutenants, 2 ensigns, 8 sergeants, 2 drumniers, and 127 rank 
and file, wounded." Total 193 — thirty-three more than there 
were in the garrison. Surely our brave sires were not the 
only sufferers that 6th day of September, 1781 ! Major Mont- 
gomery had a mother and sisters, those British captains had 



16 

wives and children, and quite as many English homes as Gro- 
ton and New London homes went into mourning because of 
that fated day. 

When Eyre had fallen and Montgomery was killed, their 
two highest officers in command, the enemy seem to have be- 
come discouraged with their losses. Stephen Hempstead says, 
''they had attacked twice with great vigor and were repulsed 
with equal firmness" — but now just at this point a luckless 
shot cut the halyards of the flag and it fell to the ground. 
"This accident." he says, "proved fatal to us, as the enemy sup- 
posed it had been struck by its defenders, rallied again, and 
rushing with redoubled impetuosity, carried the south-west 
bastion by storm. Until this moment our loss was trifling 
in number, being six or seven killed, and eighteen wounded." 
Could the battle have stopped before that flag fell, we should 
have met to day with lighter hearts, we should have come 
together to celebrate a second Battle of New Orleans, or 
rather the first. Groton Heights instead of an high altar on the 
earth bathed with sacrificial blood, would have become a field 
of victory, a plain of triumph. For the sake of England, we 
could wish the story ended here; but for the sake of America, 
let us thank Heaven that our liberties were secured at such a 
cost, that we can never lightly esteem them. Let us return 
thanks that we have no occasion for vain glorying, but rather 
for undying gratitude that our fathers here illustrated not 
only heroic valor but also heroic self sacrifice. Through all 
the years there come to us from this hill no murmurs, no com- 
plaints. Like soldiers they fought, like martyrs they fell. 

The work of the garrison was now done, brave soldier 
work, never yet excelled on any battle field. The assailants 
carried the south-west bastion, they crossed the parade and 
unbarred the gates. Colonel Ledyard had ordered his men to 
cease firing and stood in his place near the gates. Captain 
Beckwith the flag bearer was one of the first to enter. A 
British officer (probably Beckwith) shouted "Who commands 
this fort.''" Colonel Ledyard replied, "I did, sir, but you do 
now," at the same time stepping forward, and presenting his 
sword with the point toward himself. His sword was thrust 



17 

back through him by the hand that received it, and he fell 
prone on the earth. This was the signal of indiscriminate 
slaughter, and the common soldiers crossed the parade ground 
in platoons firing on the defenseless garrison, who had ground- 
ed their arms. With the bayonet they killed thrice over'those 
who were already dead. Blood flowed over all the area and 
hid the greensward. They trod in blood. There was blood 
in the magazine and in the barracks, blood was on the plat- 
forms, blood was everywhere. Out of one hundred and thirty 
able bodied men when the Brittish troops entered, they left 
scarce twenty able to stand upon their feet. There they lay 
in heaps fallen one upon another, as brave a band as fought 
with Leonidas at Thermopyle. Without the uniforms of 
soldiers but with all the valor of veterans. 

But let us turn from these distressing thoughts, nor any 
longer seek to disclose the outrages of that day. It is enough 
for us to know that the victor did not remain to enjoy his 
triumph. With sun set Arnold gathered up his wounded (the 
dead English soldiers having been buried on this hill where 
they fell) and taking with him seventy prisoners, (the wounded 
being paroled,) reembarked and set sail for New York with 
his fleet of thirty-two vessels. 

All the boasts of the Tory papers of that day could illy 
conceal the chagrin and sense of loss which the royalists felt 
over this accursed expedition. Sir Henry Clinton in his 
"General Orders" respecting it, made no attempt to disguise 
his feelings. He says: 

"Brigadier General Benedict Arnold having reported to 
the Commander-in-chief the success of the expedition against 
New London on the 6th inst.. His Excellenc}' has the pleasure 
of signifying to the army the high sense he entertains of the 
very distinguished merit of the corps employed upon that 
service. 

But whilst he draws the greatest satisfaction from the 
ardor of the troops which enabled them to carry by assault, a 
work of such strength as Fort Griswold is reputed to be, he 
cannot hut lament with the deepest co?icern the heavy loss in officers 
^nd men sustained by the 40th and 54th regiments, who had 
the honor of the attack." 



18 

But as deplorable and costly as this aflfair was to the British, 
as a strategic movement it was an utterfailure. In the language 
of Charles Botta, the historian, "this expedition was, on their 
part, but a piratical inroad, absolutely without utility. In 
vain did they endeavor to make a great noise with their march, 
and their bloody executions in Connecticut; Washington 
scarcely deigned to notice it. Unshaken in his prior de- 
signs, he knew perfectly that whoever should triumph at 
Yorktown would have decided the whole campaign in his favor. 
Instead, therefore, of sending troops into Connecticut, he 
drew them all into Virginia. Of the two attempts made to 
succor Cornwallis, (the naval battle, and the diversion against 
New London,) neitht'r Iiad obtained its obie('t." 

On Grotoii Heights I wiilkcd iiloiic, 

The sun was .m'oinj;- down, 
A nioUow nuliiinc'c round nic slionc, 
And biitlu'd Uio liill and town, * 

And liUo this niullo\v/;v liti'lit appears 
'I'lui memory of a hundred years. 

Here where I stand the heroes stood, 

A liundred years a»'o ; 
"Far east tlie same green I'lJlUni;' wood, 
The sanu' lair title below ; 

And there tlie Sound so full and l>hu', 
Hefleetinji; henvou's sereiuu hue. 

All ! was it thus the eve before 

Tliat fatal morninj;' rose? 
Were there such murmers from tlu^ shore V 
Was there tlie soft repose y 
It was a sweeter, lovlier seeue, 
iOre due dark shadow eame between. 

1 tread iqion a battle hill. 

On sternly saered ground, 
And it has nu)re to make me thrill, 
Thau all that lies around ; 
For what are laud, and sea, and skills, 
To valor shown, and sacrillee? 

Say when h;is history writ a di'ed 

More brave, nu)re true, more' slrongV 
Of Sjiarta we've no further need, 
To niorali/e a song. 
Since Ledyaid and his patriot band 
StoiMl like a eoast to uuai-d the land. 



19 

111 .sciilU'ivd i;i-avoy tlic licroi's sk'L'ii 

Hy river, pond and wood, 
Their pircious dust tlic valloyt^ kw[>, 
Tlu'ir blood tliis liill cnibrucd. 
Iniuiortalis ! wlioroso'er tlioy lie 
'riicy live wluni t;eiiei'atioiis die. 

Pcrhaiis wc I'hildron may lori;'ivo— 

Fcrluips wo liavo. foigivcn — 
The eauseless crime, but if, to strive 
The nation should be driven, ^^i- 
Tlien, with the British on lht\^lleit;hts 
We'll set a shameful wronj^' to rig'hts. 



/VDDRESS 



By LEONARD WOOLSEY BACON, of Norwich. 



Fellow Citizens : 

In the course of the successive annual celebrations of the 
tragedy once enacted on this height, we are drawing near to 
its centennial anniversary. It is natural that our thoughts 
should run forward to the completion of the century, and that 
this celebration and the next should seem to be hardly more 
than preliminary and preparatory to the more worthy cele- 
bration which will surely commemorate the great martyrdom 
of American patriotism when the full round of one hundred 
years shall have been accomplished on the 6th of September, 
1881. As we await the completion of the century, it is 
instructive to turn back to the period just a hundred years ago 
from now— the period two years before the storm of massacre 
and conflagration broke over the estuary of the Thames, while 
the clouds by which it was engendered were still brooding in 
the West and beginning to roll up toward the zenith. If we 
can tell the story of 1779 and 1780, so as to set forth the cir. 
cumstances that were working on toward so tragic a catastro- 
phe, we shall have prepared the way for the poet and orator 
who shall be thought worthy to rehearse once more the story 
of 1 78 1 to the third and fourth generation from the actors and 
sufferers therein. 

Two facts, illustrated to the eye, must be held as characteristic 
of the State of Connecticut in its relation to the War of 
Independence. The first is that bloodiest and most atrocious 



22 

deed of all the war, which is commemorated by the lofty 
obelisk beside us. The other is that this should be the only 
battle-monument within tile boundaries of the State — that 
Connecticut should be a State without battle-fields of a later 
date than the war of self-defense against the Pequot savages. 
The only exception, if it can be called an exception, is that of 
the skirmish at Danbury in 1777, and the invasion of New 
Haven in 1779. These instances are the only ones in the 
history of Connecticut for two hundred years, in which the 
armed force of an enemy has remained over night upon her 
soil. These two facts, that Connecticut should possess the 
scene of the most atrocious and malignant massacre of the war, 
and that she should possess no other battle-field, are facts that 
stand in significant relation to each other, and a relation that 
is in the highest degree honorable to the State. It was the very 
fact that the whole of her little territory was so loyal to liberty 
that oppression could never get a foothold here, — the fact that 
her whole resources of men and material were freely employed, 
not in self-defense, but in advancing the cause of, freedom 
outside of her own boundaries, through gallant deeds by land 
and sea, that instigated the invader and the tory to a special 
malignity of revenge, in the few brief and stealthy blows which 
they were able to deliver at the more exposed points of her 
seaboard. It is a grand thing to be able to point to monuments 
like those at Concord and Bunker Hill, to historic fields like 
those of Monmouth and Saratoga. But rightly understood, 
it is a far nobler thing to point, as Connecticut can, to a terri- 
tory without a battle-field, and for its solitary battle-monument 
to this silent witness to the unsurpassed heroism of her sons, 
and the unequalled ferocity of her enemies, in the war for the 
national independence. 

The chief origin of this distinction of Connecticut is doubt- 
less to be found in the fact that, alone of all the thirteen 
colonies, she entered into the struggle for independence com- 
plete, with lier governor and council and the whole machinery 
of the colonial government. In Connecticut, there never was 
a revolutionary war. In other colonies there was more or less 
of revolution. Existing authorities, having proved false to 



the people, had to be supplanted, and provisional governments, 
extemporized for the emergency, erected in their stead. We 
in Connecticut fought through a war not of revolution but of 
conservation — not for the achieving of new liberties but for 
the defense of the old. And this fact gave a solid strength to 
her resistance to British intrusions, which was impossible to 
the other colonies, burdened by the incubus of royal govern- 
ors, affected more or less by the social influence of their petty 
courts, divided, consequently, in some measure, into two 
parties, patriot and loyalist, and more or less disorganized by 
the sudden necessity of reconstructing their governmental 
machinery. It is not claiming too much for Connecticut to 
say that it was the principal base of supplies for the national 
cause, and that the grandest figure, next to Washington him- 
self, among all the heroes of that heroic age, is the figure of 
the Puritan governor, Jonathan Trumbull, *^Brother Jonathan." 
A day's ride to the north of us, beside the broad village 
street of ancient Lebanon, was the little store and counting- 
room that are justly designated in local tradition as the "War 
Office" of the War of Independence. Here was the commis- 
sariat ©n which again and again the famishing army of 
Washington drew the supplies that saved it and the country. 
It was natural enough that the strenuous patriot who was 
wielding all the resources of his State with such splendid 
energy and efficiency for the American cause should be made 
the object of peculiar spite, such as manifested itself in the 
offering of a price for his head : and it was not less obvious 
that the superb seaport, unsurpassed on all the coast for its 
natural advantages, through which the military stores and 
forces of Connecticut found their readiest outlet, should be 
regarded with jealous detestation by the adherents of the royal 
cavise. 

But this share in the general distinguished patriotism of 
the little commonwealth was not the only thing that provoked 
the peculiar malice of the British and their partisans towards 
the towns at the mouth of the Thames. A jealousy of the 
commercial enterprise and prosperity of our chief seaports 
had provoked from that quarter no small expressions of 



24 

delight at the death-blow to the sea-faring interest that had 
been dealt by the outbreak of the war. Never was exultation 
more misplaced. The expert mariners nurtured in the com- 
merce and fisheries of this great harbor, thrown out of their 
customary employment, became soon an intolerable scourge 
to the pride of the mistress of the seas. The swarms of tory 
plundering boats that ran out from the coves of Long Island 
to infest the Connecticut coast with petty raids and cattle- 
stealing expeditions, provoked the most energetic and effectual 
reprisals. Perhaps it is safe to say that the headquarters of 
the privateering warfare, as well as of the little State vessels 
equipped and armed under the direction of the tireless Gov- 
ernor Trumbull, that were the beginning of the splendid naval 
history of America, were here in the Thames. The swift, 
alert little craft scourged the tory depredators from Long 
Island back to their hiding places, and inflicted such injury 
on the supply-ships and merchant-ships that sailed under the 
enemy's flag, as to compel no small part of the naval strength 
of the greatest maritime power in the world to waste itself in 
patrolling Long Island Sound, looking up the Thames in 
passing to see the aggravating Yankee vessels scudding vip 
stream where His Majesty's ships would have found it unsafe 
tofollowthem. Vigilance like this could represstheannoyance 
in some measure, and so it did in the years 1777 and '78; for in 
those years the maritime losses of New London were heavy and 
the gains comparatively light.* But when 1779 came in, the 
fortune of war turned again, and the 'wharves of the harbor 
were soon crowded with prizes, armed and unarmed, lying 
under the guns of Forts Trumbull and Griswold, and the 
warehouses were stuffed with their cargoes, ready to be applied 
to the uses of Col. Jeremiah Wadsworth's commissariat. 

Is there any wonder, now, that with all these motives of 
exasperation and of policy working in combination on the 
mind of the enemy — with a State solid for liberty and pouring 



*So great was the vigilance of the British squadron on the coast, that between the summer 
of 1776 and that of 1778, not a single prize was brought Into the harbor of New London." 
— Miss Ccmlki/is^ Histonj of New London, p. 544. 

It is difficult fully to reconcile this statement of a most careful and painstaking writer, 
with the facts detailed In Stuart's Life of Governor Trumbull.— ^^. 347 — 350. 



K^L^ 



'd 



,tf 



25 

into the common treasury of the nation's cause her resources 
of life and material with a magnificent but exhausting liberality 
to which the experience of our generation affords no paral- 
lel — with a patriot governor, the only such officer in all the 
colonies, whose position and patriotism and calm genius for 
public business made him the bridle-hand of the young nation, 
as Washington was its sword-hand, with a sea and river front 
alive with mariners driven from their customary peaceful pur- 
suits, and ready and eager to punish the depredations of the 
invader and the traitor, and with this splendid harbor holdino- 
tlie spoil of the high seas and of the Sound, and the stores and 
warehouses filled with materials that had been turned over 
froin the cause of oppression to that of independence — is there 
any wonder, I say, that a hundred years ago, about the year 
1779, there should be a daily consciousness of peril in the 
minds of the dwellers on the Thames, from the tremendous 
maritime strength of the invading power, and that they should 
look from time to time, with anxious solicitude, to the condi- 
tion of the forts on either side of the river, with their scanty 
equipment and still more scanty garrisons.* It is impossible 
but that the misgiving must sometimes liave crept into men's 
minds whether they had done wisely to strip their own State 
of its wealth and of its men to help in distant fields, and leave 
their own homes so naked to the vengeance of the enemy. + 

It is a splendid proof of the large-minded and unselfish 
patriotism of our fathers, that such a thought seems never 
once to find expression in all their documents, still less in any 
of their doings. The spirit of Connecticut was the same in 
1780 as in i860, — a spirit of love for the whole country and 
not for her own corner of it. 

But now, in this year 1779, there comes an additional peril 
to the towns along this strip of seaboard ; for now at last the 
policy of rapine and devastation is openly adopted as a part 



*]t V at^ iibout this time (just after the bnriiiiig of Fairfield and Norwalli;! that TruiulxiU. 
piovidiu;.' for a rendezi^oiis of troop.s at New London, described it as a post "not to be left 
naked for a day." — Stuart\-< Life. 2>. 443. 

f'This town has been drained of men already, so that there is scarcely a sufliciency of 
hands left to get in the harvest." J>athaniel Shaw. Jr.. to Governor Trumbull. Aug. "7tli, 
1(7(5. Quoted by Miss Caulkins, p. 521. 



26 

of the British strategy. The pretense, long kept up to their 
own imagination, that they were the protectors of America 
from a conspiracy of insurgents, and the restorers of law and 
government, is completely abandoned by the invaders, and 
they confess that they mean to deal with their late subjects as 
alien enemies. And in what spirit of savage cruelty British 
soldiers are capable of dealing with an alien enemy, there are 
many other and more recent witnesses than Groton Heights 
and Wyoming. 

The transition to this policy is to be dated from the year 
1779, when the ripening of the French alliance gave warning 
to the British leaders both at home and in the field to make 
up their minds that their American colonies were not only 
free from their control, but that they would pass into relations 
of amity with the ancient and hereditary enemies of England. 
Then it was that the British commander in New York resolved 
that what he could not hold for the advantage of the British 
crown should be so spoiled and laid waste as to be useless to 
any other power. ^' As the armament of the tory Tryon tainted 
the western breeze, during that summer of 1779, with the 
smoke of burning New Haven and Fairfield and Norwalk, the 
only wonder to the people of Eastern Connecticut was that 
New London and Groton instead of being spared had not 
been the first victims. 

But the preparations of history for this catastrophe were not 
yet complete. It seemed as if the dramatis personae were not 
ready for their parts. The heroes, indeed, were not wanting; 
but there was no one ready and competent for the part of the 
chief villain of the plot. And it seemed as if History must 
wait until this role could be suitably filled. 

Now when a villain or knave is wanted, there has never yet 
appeared to be any lack of capacity in Connecticut to produce 



*The policy as well as benevolence of Great Britain have thus far checked the extremes 
of war. But when America jn-ofesses the unnatural design not only of estranging herself 
from us, .but of mortgaging herself to our enemies, the whole contest is changed, and the 
question is, how far Great Britain may, by any means in her power destroy and render use- 
less a connection contrived for her ruin, and for the aggnindizemeut of France." Procla- 
mation to tlie colonies, 1778. "Keep the coasts of the enemy constantly alarmed. Destroy 
their ships and magazines. Prevent the rebels from becoming cifoi-mMable mantinie poiver, 
and obstructing the commerce of his Majesty's subjects," &c. — Lord George Germain to 
Sir Henry Clinton, 1779. 



27 

him. This soil, that is the birthplace of heroes from the 
beginning, has shown that it is not incapable of bringing- 
forth the opposite. The deep and fertile earth that rears great 
forest trees for glory and for pleasant shade, sends up shoots 
of noxious weeds also, the fetid narcotics, the poison ivy and 
the poison sumach. There are no heroes in history more 
heroic than the heroes of Connecticut birth and lineage; and 
there are no traitors viler and meaner than Connecticut 
traitors. And this was' just as true a hundred years ago as it 
was eighteen years ago. If the country needs a colossal statue 
of treason to vent its execi'ations on, to set up as a lesson of 
warning and detestation for future generations, it finds the 
material for it in the same quarries of primeval granite from 
which the Roman features of Trumbull and the chivalrous 
head of Ledyard are carved for immortal fame. 

The only man in America wholly worthy to be the leader 
in the deed of infamy on Groton Heights, was, one hundred 
years ago, in 1779, perhaps the most brilliant officer in the 
continental army. In the greatest pitched battle that had 
yet been fought on this continent, and the battle attended 
with the greatest results, it was not so much the fine generalship 
of Gates, that drew the admiring gaze of the army and the 
nation, as the magnificent daring, the splendid fury- of General 
Arnold of Connecticut. As he limped away on his wounded 
leg from that victorious field, there was real danger that the 
known vices of his character would be lost from view in the 
lurid glare of his martial bravery, and that this base man, 
who never was any thing else than base, would become, among 
all the conspicuous figures of the war, the one eminent object 
of popular admiration and imitation. The treason that saved 
us from that calamity was a blessing to the nation in all its 
generations. The best use to which such a man as Arnold 
can be put, — a brilliant man, patriotic from considerations of 
expediency, and when expediency seems to take the other side 
a patriot no longer — the only good use that the country has for 
such a man is to set him in the pillory of public scorn, and 
teach each new generation of growing boys to abhor him. 
And that is the use that we put Benedict Arnold to, to-day. 



28 

A hundred years ago to-day, as I have said, Arnold was the 
most brilliant officer in the continental service. A hundred 
years ago next September, he was a traitor, in disgrace, fleeing 
from the sight of honorable and patriotic men, and loathed 
and abhorred even by those who had bought him and paid for 
him and were ready to use him on the base business, unworthy 
of the name of war, to which they had now resolved to stoop. 
At last it seemed that History had completed her dramatic 
preparations, and the curtain was ready to rise on a scene of 
slaughter. Only a brief rehearsal of his part, by the burning 
of Richmond and the devastation of other parts of Virginia, 
and Arnold is ready when September comes round again, one 
year from the date of his treason, to disembark from a British 
ship in the bright daylight of the morning of September Gth, 
1 78 1, with his band of foreign incendiaries and assassins, and 
take his stand on the tomb of the Winthrops, to direct the de- 
struction of the town and the slaughter of his fellow-citizens 
and neighbors. 

There is a curious superficial resemblance to be observed 
between the battle of Groton Heights and the battle of Bunker 
Hill. In each case, there was the storming of a hill-top fort 
by a vastly superior force of regular troops against a scanty 
garrison of untrained militia- In each case the successful 
storm was accompanied by the burning of the neighboring 
town. In each case the military defeat is commemorated by 
a granite obelisk, and the memory of it is cherished proudly 
as more precious than the memory of many victories. It may 
even be said that the likeness runs deeper than these outside 
circumstances, and that as the brave fighting ot the farmers on 
Bunker , Hill committed the people to the commencement of 
the war, so the more heroic suffering and dying of the martyrs 
of Groton Height made it thenceforth impossible so much as 
to think of the compromises and concessions which already 
again and again the British government had been offering to 
the American people on condition of their renewed allegiance. 
If ever, in the discouragements, and the inexpressible exhaus- 
tion and distress of this protracted war, the people had been 
ready to yield the great issue of Independence, the folly and 



20 

wickedness of the enemy himself had been God's instrument 
for the deliverin^y the land from that peril. After the death of 
I.edyard and his neighbors, there could be no end of the war 
but in victory. The victory was not far away, indeed ; for the 
glory of Yorktown was nigh at hand. But there was need, 
nevertheless for the horror of Groton Heights. The blood of 
all these martyrs was not spilled in vain.* 

As I have traced the tragical records of the massacre of 
Groton Height, and goiie through the roster of "the embattled 
farmers" who died within this bloody inclosure, and their 
associates in the great struggle, the thing that more than any 
other has made the story real and vivid before my eyes has 
been the old family names, still extant and familiar in this 
region, to show that the sons of those sires still hold the soil 
their fathers died in defending. I read on the roll of the 
dead the name of Nathan Sholes, and cannot help thinking of 
the man with the steadiest arm and the surest rifle last Sep- 
tember on the camp-ground of the Third Regiment at Niantic. 
I come elsewhere upon the name of Joe Huribut, and immedi- 
ately I think of the pale New London bo)^ who divided with 
his fellow townsman and classmate Branclegee the highest hon- 
ors of our college class at Vale, but whose peaceful laurels 
were laid with him in the early grave in which he sleeps in 
Christian hope. I come again upon the ncunQoi Marvin Wait, 
and wonder to think how well the heroism of a hundred years 
ago was reproduced in our own time under the same name, in 
the person of the chivalrous young soldier of Norwich. When 
I read the record of the doughty service and the ingenious 
persistency, of that ancient mariner Jeremiah Halsey, it is 



*The Plan of Conciliation of Lord North was submitted to I^arliament in February, 1778. 
and sent to America in April of the same year. Even so early in the war, it was answered 
to these proposals, as in the noble letter of Governor Trumbull to the tory Tryon ; * * * * 
"the barbarous inhumanity which has marked the prosecution of the war on your part in its 
several stages : the insolence which displays itself on every petty advantage : the cruelties 
which have been exercised on those unhappy men whom the fortune of ^var has thrown into 
your hands : all these are inseparable bars to the very idea of concluding a peace with Great 
Britain on anv other conditions than the most perfect and absolute independence." — Stuarts 
Life. p. 40ti 

In like tenor, but with greater asperity General Persons answered other overtures of Tryon. 
after the Imniinu- of Fairfield and Norwalk, 1779. See his letter in Hollister"s History of 
Connecticut, vol. ii, p. 379 How this feeling was intensified by the Groton Massacre is 
nowhere so touchingly and eloquently shown as in the rude epitaphs of the victims scat- 
tered among the neighboring graveyards, and transcribed in Mr. Harris's admirable memo- 
rial pamphlet. 



30 

impossible not to think how some of his qualities are still 
shining at the front of the New London County bar, and 
winning victories of peace, not less renowned. But it is a 
still more striking illustration of the soundness of the stock 
and the genuineness of the pedigree, when we see the martyr 
name of Ledyard borne by his nearest kinsman in the very 
front of the pioneers of African Exploration and the great- 
grandson of Col. McClellan the commander of New London 
harbor, flinging the thunderbolts that pierced the hostile lines 
at Antietam. 

O fellow-citizen of Connecticut, and especially, O men of 
Groton, children of these martyred heroes, be proud of the 
stock from which you are descended — proud with that worthy 
and honest pride which shall lead you to emulate the virtues 
of the race from which you are sprung! You do well to 
build your school-house in the shadow of this lofty obelisk, 
and to let this arena of the bloody struggle be trodden year 
by year in the happy sports of boys and girls. But think what 
shame it were before the world, if the children of such ances- 
tors should prove recreant to their glorious name .'' Think 
what a legacy of glory and ennobling responsibility has come 
down to you, to be kept and handed dovi^n unimpaired and 
enhanced to your children after you! 

"Guard well yonr trust — 
The faith that dared the sea. 
The truth that made them free, 
Their cherished purity, 

Their s-arnered dust!" 



ijSi. Septembee^ 6th. 1881. 

THE 

Battle of Groton Heights; 

The Massacre of Fort Griswold; 

— AND — 

The Burning of Ngw London. 



HISTORICAL SKETCH BY JOHN J. COPP, ESQ., OF GROTON 



ADDRESS BY LEONARD WOOLSEY BACON, OF NORWICH, 



The Ninety-Eighth Anniversary, Sept. 6th, 1879. 



'•If I were an American, as I am an Englishman, while a foreign troop was landed in 
my country, I never would lay down my arms— never, never, never.'''' 
"Yon cannot, my lords, ijow cannot conquer America.'''' — Lord Chatham. 



Published by authority of 

The Groton Heights Centennial Committee. 

December. ISTQ. 



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